NBC: Worst Abuse at Al Ghraib Done by Iraqi Recruits

Some of the worst abuse in the Al Ghraib prison scandal was reportedly perpetrated by Iraqi guards recruited by the U.S. military and brought into to the jail to help maintain control of the growing population of Iraqi detainees.

And while most of the allegations against U.S. military police involve harassment and intimidation tactics that did not cause physical harm, the Iraqi recruits allegedly raped several detainees.

"The Iraqi guards apparently engaged in rape of female prisoners and perhaps some young boys," reported NBC Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski on Tuesday.

Miklaszewski told radio host Don Imus that the Iraqi guards had been recruited "in an effort to control the Iraqis inside the prison. The American military invited Iraqis - they trained them up ever so briefly and put them into the prison."

Miklaszewski described another case where "one of these Iraqi guards smuggled in knives and a gun to one of the prisoners and there was a shoot-out in the cell. He was shot to death, an MP was wounded."

Until now, press reports have made no mention of the role played by Iraqi guards in some of worst aspects of the prison abuse scandal. Extensive quotes by the New Yorker Magazine and the Los Angeles Times from a preliminary military report on the abuse scandal failed to note any involvement by Iraqi guards.

Previously, the worst allegation to emerge from the prison abuse scandal was the charge that one of the detainees had been sodomized with a light bulb or a broomstick. But the military report as excerpted by the Los Angeles Times did not specifically identify the perpetrator as American.

Editor's note: